Plans for Putney High Street for the next five years will be put to local businesses on Wednesday evening.
Positively Putney, the business improvement district that since 2017 has funded street security and crime prevention work with the police, run the town centre’s main seasonal events, and paid for cleaning, festive lights and greening, launches its third-term plan at the Spotted Horse on Putney High Street between 5.30pm and 7.30pm.
Guests will see the plan for the first time, meet the staff and directors, and watch a new film about the organisation. The event is for Putney BID businesses only and next month, the same 400 Putney businesses will vote on whether the organisation continues for a third term running from 2027 to 2032. If they vote no, it closes on 31 March 2027.
Positively Putney is funded by a compulsory levy on business premises in a defined area of the town centre. The rate is 1.27 per cent of a property’s rateable value, charged annually in advance on any premises valued at £12,000 or more. Tenants of the Putney Exchange and non-retail charities pay 1 per cent. Wandsworth Council collects the money on the organisation’s behalf, separately from ordinary business rates.
The area covers the whole the High Street plus parts of Putney Hill, Putney Bridge Road, Putney Wharf, Upper and Lower Richmond Road, and shops in the side roads off the High Street including Chelverton, Disraeli, Felsham and Lacy. Owners of empty units pay too, with no void period.
What the money paid for
In the year to March 2026 the levy raised £341,253, and the organisation spent £355,159.
The largest share, £141,365, went on what it calls enhancing Putney: overnight pavement cleaning by a contracted two-person team, the Church Square Christmas tree and festive lights, hanging baskets and planters, recycling schemes, and plain-clothes security officers working with the Thamesfield police team and the Shopwatch group.
A further £84,808 went on promotion and events, including the website, the Christmas brochure delivered to 30,000 homes across Putney, Wandsworth, Fulham and Barnes, and an annual programme costing about £40,000 that covers the Christmas lights switch-on, Amazing August, the Halloween trail and the ice sculpture trail.
The 2021 plan allocated 35 per cent to promoting Putney and 25 per cent to enhancing it. In 2025 to 2026 enhancing took 40 per cent and promoting 24 per cent. Supporting businesses fell from 22 to 20 per cent and overheads from 18 to 16 per cent.
Business services took £71,254, covering the newsletter, footfall and spending data, training, mystery shopping and the Prefer Putney employee discount card. Running the organisation, which has four staff, cost £57,732.
What the third-term plan contains will not be known until Wednesday. The consultation the organisation ran with businesses earlier this year asked them to tick which new services interested them, and that list gives the clearest indication: accreditation as a business crime reduction partnership, uniformed security staff on the streets, better wayfinding signs, a Putney gift card, a marketing support package, regular networking events, discounted parking for employees, and bulk buying schemes to cut energy and supply costs.
Levy collected rose from £268,550 in 2017/18 to £341,253 in 2025/26, with a fall to £175,000 in 2020/21 during the pandemic. The 2022/23 figure includes £44,271 of arrears from the first term. The rate rose from 1.25 to 1.27 per cent in 2025/26.
2020/21 Collection fell during the pandemic, which the accounts attribute to Covid-19.
2022/23 The first year of the current term also brought in £44,271 of unpaid levy left over from the first term, taking the total collected that year to £342,825.
2025/26 The rate rose from 1.25 to 1.27 per cent, the increase the board is permitted to apply each year.
How the vote works
Businesses paying the levy get a vote for each rated unit they occupy, so a company with two shops has two votes. Residents do not get a vote.
For the organisation to continue, two separate tests have to be passed. A majority of the businesses that vote must vote yes, and the combined rateable value of those voting yes must exceed the combined rateable value of those voting no i.e. the larger businesses also need to back the plans.
The date of the vote has not yet been published. Positively Putney’s website says October 2026, and the rules require formal notice at least 42 days before the ballot and papers at least 28 days before it.
Of 396 businesses entitled to vote in 2021, 172 voted in favour, 32 returned papers that were against or rejected, and 192 did not vote. No resident had a vote.
Last time the BID was renewed, in 2021, a copy of the plan was posted to every business in the town centre on 24 September, the launch four days later was livestreamed, papers went out on 14 October, the ballot closed on 11 November and the result was announced the following day. Of 396 businesses entitled to vote, 204 returned papers and 172 backed a second term.
The 2021 plan also told businesses what a no vote would mean: the organisation would cease to exist, and no replacement body would take on the security, the events, the marketing, the cleaning or the lights.
Twenty-five people have been registered as directors of Putney BIDCO Limited since June 2016. A figure linked to Wandsworth Council sat on the board for roughly eight of those ten years. Eight directors are currently in post against twelve places provided for in the company’s own rules. Councillor Salvatore Murtas joined the board in July 2026 and is not on the register of directors.
It’s sad but perhaps understandable that almost half of businesses did not vote. You would have thought it logical that companies active in Putney would want to improve the area where they make their money! Yes I think it would make sense to expand the BID Positively Putney scheme to include residents. After all, we already pay extra for the Common, why not for this? Disclaimer: when I had my business in Putney I was an avid supporter of everything Positively Putney was doing and it irks me that I’m retired and still living here and cannot do more to help!